Letter from Tim Sears, Program Director and Co-Founder
Happy 2008!  We started off the new year by moving into our new office at 1610 Harrison Street in downtown Oakland, and getting our new Southern California office settled in Carson. We need the extra space, because we are in the process of bringing on five new staff members. We've already hit the ground running in 2008 with four installations in January, including two in San Francisco and our first two homes in Fresno! We have well over 100 installations planned for the year, and we are working hard to add more so we can help more low-income families and make sure we have plenty of volunteer opportunities for our amazing volunteers.

We are particularly excited about growing our Team Leader program and starting our new Solar Installer Trainee program. The Team Leaders are experienced GRID Alternatives’ volunteers that help lead volunteer crews - visit the Team Leader page on our website for more information if you're interested. The Solar Installer Trainee program is a new 12 week paid internship for low-income community members who have completed a local construction training program, and are interested in gaining the hands-on experience they need to get a job as a solar installer.

With exciting new solar programs popping up everywhere from the from the California Public Utilities Commission to the City of San Francisco, 2008 is poised to be a banner year for GRID Alternatives and the low-income families we serve. We're looking forward to working with all of you take advantage of these exciting opportunities. We're also hiring for two additional AmeriCorps*VISTA members, so if any of you are interested in spending the next year with us, we'd love to have you apply - see our website for details. --Tim

Volunteer Projects & Solarthon 2007 Success!
Since our last update in late September, we've installed a whopping 47 solar electric systems for low-income homeowners - our best quarter ever! The quarter was dominated by two big events, Solarthon 2007 in Oakland, and Jimmy Carter Work Project 2007 (see next section) in Los Angeles. Solarthon 2007 was a huge success, installing eight low-income solar electric systems for low-income first-time homeowners in East Oakland while raising $40,000 for community solar power. Thanks to all the individual participants and corporate sponsors who made this happen. Upcoming projects in the next few months include several installs in San Francisco's Bayview/Hunter's Point and Potrero neighborhoods, San Mateo, Brentwood, Pittsburg and more. Watch our volunteer mailing list for the dates as they're finalized, and email us at info@gridalternatives.org if you're not on the list and would like to be added.

GRID Alternatives launches LA Regional Office
From Oct. 28th thru Nov. 2nd GRID Alternatives launched our new Los Angeles Regional Office by installing 30 solar electric systems in South Los Angeles and San Pedro as part of Habitat for Humanity International's Jimmy Carter Work Project 2007 event. This is Habitat International's major annual event, held each year in different cities around the world, and this is the first year that it has featured solar as a standard feature on all homes. A big thanks go out to the Dow Foundation and IBEW Local 11 for their support to make this project a reality.

GRID Alternatives used this project to launch our Los Angeles Regional Office, which will be partnering with local nonprofit housing developers such as Habitat for Humanity Greater Los Angeles, as well as local City and County agencies, to install solar electric systems for low-income homeowners in Southern California. We want to welcome aboard Susie Chang, our new Los Angeles Regional Director, and we are currently bringing on additional staff for her office. We'll soon have a way for Southern California volunteers to sign up for local volunteer opportunities - watch our website for more details!

GRID Alternatives & Job Training
GRID Alternatives has been working hard to help develop "green pathways out of poverty" by supporting both local and national green jobs initiatives. On a local level, we just completed the first cycle of our in-house solar installer job trainee program, and our first trainee, Taulafo "Lafo" Laulu has just graduated to work for a large local solar installer. The process was great for us to get direct experience with the challenges involved in training folks for solar careers, and we look forward to building on that experience with our new Solar Installer Trainee program described above. We also completed two installations in the City of Richmond in partnership with Solar Richmond, using all local job trainees from the City's Richmond BUILD job training program. Some of you may have seen the recent piece in TIME Magazine, which profiled our most Richmond projects, sponsored by our friends over at SunPower Corporation! These efforts are garnering national attention and are helping push forward the national "Green Jobs" movement being led by Van Jones of Oakland's Green for All & Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. As a result of their efforts, the Green Jobs Act of 2007 was recently signed into law, authorizing $125 million for green job training programs nationwide!

Thank You!
Once again we have many people and organizations to thank over the last three months who have made all of our work possible. We want to again thank our corporate sponsors for Solarthon 2007, including PG&E, SolarCity, ENVIRON, Google, WaMu and RMC Water and Environment, as well as all the individual fundraisers who raise money at the Solarthon. A particular shout-out goes to our top fundraiser, Maikhanh Nguyen, who raised an amazing $2,530 - more than double our previous record! We also want to thank Patagonia San Francisco for their support of our Solar Affordable Housing Program, and the Pacific Energy Center for hosting our winter Friendraiser holiday party and volunteer appreciation event.

Finally, we want to send our heartfelt thanks to Lafo Laulu for his dedicated service to GRID Alternatives as our Construction Assistant over the past two years. Many of you know Lafo and have worked with him out on our installation projects, and know what an amazing asset he has been to the GRID Alternatives family. Thank you, Lafo, for all your work bringing renewable energy to the folks who need it the most, and we wish you a long and successful career in the solar industry!

GRID Alternatives eNewsletter - Winter 2007-08
Please note new address: 1610 Harrison Street, Suite C, Oakland, CA 94612
(415) 839-8437 | info@gridalternatives.org | www.gridalternatives.org